An airline ticket(automated ticket and boarding pass)l which has hitherto been used, is separated along a perforated line 2 as shown in FIG. 19 into a coupon 1a collected by an airline at a boarding gate of an airplane, and a boarding pass 1b handed over to a passenger. Then, all or some items of boarding information about a name of airline, a flight number, a name of departure airport, a name of arrival airport, a via-destination, a fare, a name of passenger, a seat number, a class of seat and a feature of seat, are visually printed on the front surfaces of the coupon 1a and the boarding pass 1b. On the other hand, a continuous magnetic stripe 3 is so formed on the underside (a surface shown in FIG. 19) of the airline ticket as to extend over the coupon 1a and the boarding pass 1b. This magnetic stripe 3 is, as illustrated in FIG. 20, divided into n-lines of tracks in a direction orthogonal to a dotted line 2. The boarding information is all recorded on the respective tracks. On a first track, however, there is written a predetermined item of information which makes sense only when the information is read from a head (on the side of the coupon) to a terminal (on the side of the passenger ticket) of the first track, and the first track is used for judging whether or not the airline ticket has been used. Note that the information thus recorded on the magnetic stripe 3 or signal-form information recordable on the magnetic stripe 3 is hereinafter referred to as "MS data".
In a seat management system using such an airline ticket 1, a passenger at first submits a reservation form in which the boarding information is written to a branch office of the airline or a travel agency, and makes a request for reserving the airline ticket. Then, a person in charge (an operator) in the branch office of the airline or the travel agency inputs the information written in the reservation form by use of an airline ticket issuing apparatus, and communicates with the seat reservation system in the head office of the airline via a communications line, thus executing a process of confirming the reservation of the ticket. Then, the air ticket issuing apparatus, when the reservation is confirmed, issues the airline ticket 1 on the basis of ticket issue data which the seat reservation system notifies. At this time, the MS data are recorded on the air ticket 1 the above-described boarding information is visually printed thereon.
When it becomes predetermined time before a boading time, the passenger submits the airline ticket 1 to a check-in counter of the airline in the airport. A person in charge at the check-in counter reads the boarding information from the magnetic stripe 3 on this airline ticket 1 by using a check-in confirmation apparatus, thus confirming the reservation to the seat reservation system. Then, when finally confirmed, the person in charge returns the airline ticket 1 to the passenger.
When it becomes the boading time, the passenger hands over the airline ticket 1 to the person in charge of the airline at a boarding gate. The person in charge at the boarding gate inserts this airline ticket 1 into a boarding confirmation apparatus. The boarding confirmation apparatus reads the boarding information from the magnetic stripe, and collates it with the boarding information (the data for confirmation) read by the check-in confirmation apparatus, thereby making a boarding confirmation. Then, when the boarding confirmation is completed, the person in charge cuts away the airline ticket 1 along a perforated line 2, and hands over the passenger ticket 1b to the passenger while collecting the coupon 1a. When the airline ticket 1 is thus cut away, it follows that the respective tracks of the magnetic stripe 3 are disconnected halfway. Hence, even if the passenger ticket 1b is reinserted into the boarding confirmation apparatus, the boarding information can not be read any more. Accordingly, it is prevented such a problem that the same boarding information is compared double with the confirmation data, which might be recognized as double booking. The passenger boards on the airplane with this passenger ticket 1b and sits on the seat identical with the seat number printed on the passenger ticket 1b.
On the other hand, nowadays, in a great majority of countries, it is compulsory that a foreigner should submit an entry card when entering the country. A sheet of this entry card is distributed by a crew member in the airplane, and therefore the passenger must write necessary items on the sheet of the entry card in the airplane until the airplane arrives at the country, excluding such a case that the passenger prepares the entry card beforehand. In many cases, however, names of items to be filled in the entry card and a guide to fill are written on the entry card in English and an official language of that country, and the languages usable for filling the required items are limited to English and the official language of that country. Accordingly, the fill-in process on the entry card is troublesome to persons unable to understand those languages and unaccustomed to traveling abroad, and therefore a mistake in writing easily occurs. Further, it might often happen that the passenger takes out a passport by opening a store box above the head in order to confirm a passport number required to be written on the entry card by most of countries. This process is very troublesome as well as being rather dangerous when an air flow is unstable. Moreover, some persons who get sick or fall into sleep during the flight on the airplane might, even though proficient in those languages, feel it quite painful to fill in the entry card. For this reason, it has been desired to develop a system capable of automatically creating the entry card without the troublesome process of handwriting by the passenger.
A most prospective system in this concept involves the use of the MS data recorded on the magnetic stripe of the airline ticket 1. As described above, however, the MS data recorded on the magnetic stripe 3 of the conventional airline ticket 1 are only the information relative to the boarding but do not contain any information needed when creating the entry card. The magnetic stripe 3 formed on the airline ticket 1 is formatted so that the same track extends across the perforated line 2 over the coupon 1a and the passenger ticket 1b. Therefore, when the airline ticket 1 is cut away at the time of boarding, it follows that the MS data recorded on the magnetic stripe 3 are regarded as invalid data, and it is impossible to make the use of the MS data for creating the entry card in the airplane.
It is an object of the present invention to make an entry card creating information to be read from a passenger ticket 1b which had been separated from an airline ticket 1 by recording all items of the entry card creating information on the passenger ticket 1b of the air ticket 1 so that an entry card can be automatically created based on the read entry card creating information.